


Secrets

by nasreenparachaisalesbianicon



Category: Ackley Bridge (TV)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-06
Updated: 2018-08-08
Packaged: 2019-06-22 18:38:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,082
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15588225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nasreenparachaisalesbianicon/pseuds/nasreenparachaisalesbianicon
Summary: Nas has always been unlucky in love, but now she feels like her luck could be getting even worse.Alya has always been afraid of getting hurt so hates letting people know the real her.





	1. 1

**Author's Note:**

> dunno if this'll be good (it'll probably be shit bc i scraped a C in english) but i just wanted to try and give Nas the nice, non-racist girlfriend she deserves

     Nas always seemed to be unlucky with who she fell for. First it was her biology teacher, then her own mum catfishing her and then it was a racist. She was starting to think she’d never find anyone and was a bit too hasty in calling off her engagement to Naveed, even if that was fake at least the majority of people wouldn’t know she was alone.

     Well, not all of that was strictly true. There was someone else who she’d fallen for, someone else she knew could never ever like her back. But that wasn’t important. Not really. She was trying to push her feelings away so it was fine. It wasn’t as though her heart skipped slightly whenever she saw her, or like she couldn’t think about her without turning slightly red. There was definitely none of that.

“Nas, are you alright?” Missy asked, throwing a chip at her friend. “You’ve been proper quiet.”

“Yeah Missy I’m fine,” Nas mumbled.

“Are you sure? You’re not still upset about that bloody Murgatroyd are ya?” she questioned. “Because I have told you Nasreen you can do better than her.”

“Missy I said I’m fine,” Nas replied, snapping slightly.

“Alright… alright,” Missy said, holding her hands up as a way of surrendering. “But I mean you can talk to me about anything.”

“Seriously, I’m fine, there’s just something I need to try to get over,” Nas answered, the first actually honest thing she’d said the entire conversation.

“So I am right then?” Missy queried. “It is about Sam?”

“No,” Nas sighed, it’s someone else.

“Nasreen Paracha you dark horse!” Missy exclaimed, far louder than Nas wished. “Who is it?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Nas mumbled. “Nothing happened because she’ll never feel the same.”

“Tell me,” Missy commanded. “We tell each other everything.”

“Fine,” Nas said exasperatedly as she leaned over into Missy’s ear to whisper the name of the girl she liked.

 

 

     Alya Nawaz was the queen of secrets. Nobody really knew anything about her, not her family, not her friends, and certainly not Cory Wilson who seemed desperate to try to win her affections. She was too afraid to let people in. Too afraid of being judged. Too afraid of being rejected. Too afraid of being left alone. Everyone, even her own friends probably, just saw her as this cold bitch but if they knew what she was hiding, oh if they only knew, they’d be pretty cold too.

     It was bad enough that her family had gone bankrupt and she was having to live in a tiny house with so many cousins that she could barely move without practically stepping on one, but it also meant that she couldn’t live out her dream of taking over her father’s company and making him truly proud of her. She already felt as though she had to work ten times has hard just to get the same level of appreciation from her father as Riz did without even trying, but now everything she’d been working for for the last few years was gone. Gone before she’d even had the chance of trying.

     But there was someone else who Alya was trying to impress through all this. Someone who, if they tried hard enough, would easily be able to melt away Alya’s ice queen exterior and get to know the real her. But unfortunately Alya was pretty sure that they hated her anyway which clearly didn’t help matters. Of course there was another reason why it just simply wouldn’t work, a reason that Alya hadn’t quite managed to come to terms with herself yet, but it was the reason why Alya’s affections would never be reciprocated. Her mystery crush, well, it was a girl. And in this town, that meant that either had to get over it fast or get your heartbroken.

     She knew the best way to try to get over it would be to tell someone, but who? Aneesa and the rest of the girls wouldn’t understand, and besides, she was terrified of how they’d react, her and Riz barely spoke about anything these days anyway and then there was no way she’d ever tell her parents, they’d never approve.

 

“Alya, what are you doing?” she heard a voice say, interrupting her thoughts.

“What?” she asked, snapping her head back round from the window she’d been staring out of to see Nas Paracha staring at her, an expression of concern on her face.

“It’s just you’re never normally by yourself,” Nas replied, and Alya thought she saw her face soften slightly.

“Can’t a girl have time to think by herself sometimes?” Alya questioned. “Anyway what’s it to you?”

“Nothing, I just wanted to make sure you were okay,” Nas answered, feeling her face begin to grow warm.

“It’s not like we’re friends or anything,” Alya said coolly. “Even if something was wrong, do you seriously think I’d tell you?”

“Oh forget it then,” Nas whispered and rushed off. 

 

     As Nas rushed away, Alya could feel her insides start to ache. But this was what she had to do. She had to push her away, if she didn’t, then she’d have no hope of getting over it. That’s right. Nas Paracha was the girl she liked. Nas Paracha who’d been with Cory Wilson, who’d had sex, who’d been engaged, and who was quite obviously straight. Nas Paracha was the girl who made Alya want to smile and laugh and let break down her walls that had taken her so long to build up. But past Alya had blown that and she couldn’t start acting differently now so she just had to do what was best, carry on acting the same and push her even further away, however much it hurt her to do.


	2. 2

“Missy what the hell were you thinking?” Nas hissed at her friend as she grabbed her arm and dragged her down the corridor.

“What have I done now?” Missy asked. “Get off me!”

“You told me to talk to Alya,” Nas said as she dragged her into a secluded corner.

“Ooooooh how did it do?” Missy questioned with a smile.

“Awful!” Nas exclaimed. “She hates me.”

“Are you sure though?” Missy queried. “Maybe you’re just overreacting?”

“I asked if she was okay and she practically bit me head off,” Nas sighed. “Maybe I’m just destined to be forever alone.”

“Nas there’s someone out there who’s perfect for ya, you just haven’t found them yet,” Missy assured, giving a friend a hug to ease her worries.

     Nas hated herself for how she was dealing with this. She always swore to herself she’d never get this upset by a crush, but this felt different. Maybe it was because of the fact she never got the chance to act on anything. She thought she’d accepted the fact that it would never happen, this was Alya Nawaz after all, but somehow it made it worse. She wished she’d just had once chance to try and impress her or have fun with her. One chance was all she asked for, but one chance was something she’d never get.

 

     It was amazing how lonely a person could feel despite having friends. This was something Alya had been noticing more and more recently. If there was no one you could talk to, like really talk to, then did you even have anyone? She longed for the days that her and Riz were able to talk to each other about anything. Ever since she’d posted that picture of Cory, he could barely look at her, even Cory had forgiven her, but her own brother till refused to make eye contact. She knew what she’d done was wrong, but she couldn’t help missing her brother. Maybe she’d have a chance of making up with him if she tried talking, she’d already blown one chance of reconciliation today, but maybe she could actually be successful with a second try.

“Riz, can we talk?” Alya said, trying to compose herself from her nerves which she couldn’t help but feel slightly ashamed of. “In private.”

“Good luck finding that in this house,” Riz muttered, but still slowly go to his feet so that the pair of them could try to find somewhere that wasn’t overrun by cousins.

“I’m sorry,” Alya said, once they’d actually got some privacy. “I know I was wrong for what I did, and I regret it but it’s not like I can go back and change anything now. And even Cory’s forgiven me so why can’t you?”

“He’s my best friend, I’m always gonna defend him,” Riz answered. “You hurt him and that’s hard for me to forgive.”

“I’m your sister, don’t you care about me?” Alya asked, proving herself to be far more vulnerable than she’d planned to be in this conversation and far more vulnerable than she could remember herself being in years.

“I mean of course I do,” Riz replied.

“Can I tell you something?” Alya rushed, hearing her blood pumping in her ears. She didn’t know where she’d got the sudden courage from, maybe it was how much she actually liked being honest and vulnerable for once. How she actually enjoyed feeling like herself around someone for a change and not having to feel afraid of someone seeing the real her.

“Yeah sure,” Riz said, not realising the seriousness of the situation to Alya.

“I- well, I think I like Nas Paracha,” Alya confessed, simultaneously thrilled to have finally been able to let this off her chest but also terrified by the look on Riz’s face.

“You what? No way,” Riz said in disbelief. “You’re having me on.”

“I should’ve known,” Alya uttered. “I should’ve known you wouldn’t accept me, I shouldn’t have told you.”

“Woah what?” Riz remarked. “I never said that. I’m surprised but it’s fine.”

“It’s what?” Alya exclaimed.

“It’s fine,” Riz reiterated. “I just thought you hated her.”

“So did I,” Alya sighed. “Maybe the reason I was so horrible to her about being friends with Missy and sleeping with Naveed was because I was jealous, rather than anything else.”

“This is weird,” Riz said, earning a confused expression from Alya. “We just never talk about serious stuff that’s all.”

“We just never talk Riz,” Alya murmured.

“What you gonna do about Nas then?” Riz asked.

“Nothing,” Alya replied, staring at the floor. There was nothing she could do without outing herself, and that wasn’t something she planned on doing to anyone else any time soon, never mind someone who hated her.

“Try talking to her,” Riz said. “You might be surprised.”

“What’s that meant to mean?” Alya asked in shock.

“Well you surprised me, so maybe Nas’ll surprise you is all,” Riz said as he went to walk off.

“Thanks Riz,” Alya said quietly so he could barely hear.

     Alya had decided. Her chat with Riz made one thing clear and that was that she had to start being honest with people. Not yet, of course, but she wanted to be eventually. She had to be. Maybe she could start with Nas. Apologising to her, making things better, maybe even becoming friends. This was going to be the start of a new Alya. Not even a new Alya technically, just the real Alya. She was going to do this. She was. She had to.

 

     Nas knew she was overreacting with all this Alya stuff but she couldn’t help it. There was something about it that felt different this time. This time it felt more real, stronger than before. She had no idea why, Alya was a bit of a cold bitch sometimes really, but there was something about her that Nas found intriguing sometimes. She didn’t feel like anyone knew the real Alya, and she wanted to be the first one who did. She wanted to be the one to break Alya’s walls down, to see into who she was. She wanted that to be her, not Cory Wilson or whatever other guy tried it on with her. But it could never happen. Alya was straight and even if she wasn’t, she hated Nas anyway so it’d never work. The easiest thing to do would just be to stay away from Alya from now on, not take Missy’s advice and try and talk to her. Just stay away from her, out of sight, out of mind. It wasn’t like they were friends anyway so it wouldn’t even matter. She’d just stay as far away from Alya as possible, simple as that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm sorry i'm so bad at this 
> 
> these two deserve actually decent writing

**Author's Note:**

> eyyyyyy instead of short and sweet this short and shite


End file.
